Code Lyoko: XANA Returns
by Carol of the Elves
Summary: The story of what happens when the Lyoko Warriors think they've killed XANA, and have yet to realize they just made their lives a whole lot worse.
1. The Sleepwalker

Hi, I'm Mystic Peyton, and this is my first fanfic. Hope you like it.

Disclaimer: I don't own code Lyoko. Moonscoop, Antefilms, Taffy, France 3, and Canal J do.

Aelita rolled over on her small bed in her dorm room at Kadic Academy. It was four in the morning and no one, not even she nor Jeremie Belpois were awake at this hour. Abruptly, she rolled further over, letting the covers of the bed slip off, as she stood up, eyes still closed, mind still in everlasting sleep.

"Daddy, help me," she mumbled still asleep as she began to clumsily sleep-walk towards her door. One heavy step dragged in front of the other as she barefoot walked down the corridor. She passed doors to her right and left but no one saw and no one heard what Aelita Schaeffer was doing.

Aelita slowly walked down the stairs and found her way outside into the courtyards of the school. "Daddy, Franz Hopper, Lyoko, XANA," she mumbled again turning and walking her way down the street straight past the Ishiyama residence.

Yumi's House

Yumi Ishiyama was not awake at this hour, but her younger brother Hiroki was. Hiroki had just finished level sixty in Ninja Battle video game and sleep-deprived glanced out the window to see a pink-hared figure walk by like a zombie.

"Isn't that Aelita, Yumi's friend?" Hiroki wondered to himself, opening the window and jumping down into the bush beside her. The sleeping Aelita turned towards the sound of Hiroki but kept going down the street.

Hiroki curious as to where this girl might be going at four in the morning, tailed her. Within five minutes the pair found themselves at the old abandoned factory. It was then, as Aelita clumsily slid her way down the ropes connecting the upper platform to the ground, Hiroki realized that the pink-haired girl was sleepwalking.

Hiroki slid down the rope following Aelita to an old freight elevator. He was about to pipe up and wake the sleeping Lyoko Warrior by warning her against the old rusty thing as it opened up and she stepped forward. Hiroki quickly shuffled in as well.

The sleeper opened up a panel in the side of the elevator and punched in a combination. The door opened with a loud twist of clicks and clacks and a cold room appeared with a large dias with an emblem of an eye in the center of it.

"Whoa," said Hiroki thinking he was in some kind of action movie. Aelita stepped forward mumbling, "XANA, Lyoko is not gone," as she slid the lever up. The dias, which in reality was a supercomputer, began to hum with energy, as a beam of light sparked in the room. "Uh…Aelita," mumbled Hiroki a little louder, but still Aelita was in too deep a sleep to hear him.

Aelita found her way over to a metal ladder on the wall and began to climb upward. Hiroki, nervous but still curious nonetheless, followed her wondering where in the hell she was going.

Supercomputer Room

Aelita sat down in Jeremie's chair and began to punch in some keys as the monitors lit up. "Aelita," said Hiroki finally mustering the courage to speak loudly, "What are you doing? Why are you messing with this computer? Wake up, you're sleepwalking!" Aelita's eyes snapped open. "H-Hiroki? What are you doing here?"

Hiroki stood forward and replied, "I was going to ask you the same thing, girl."

Aelita glanced around trying to find a way around this obstacle. Since she had been asleep she didn't know how much Hiroki had seen, and she also didn't know how she'd gotten here.

"Hiroki," she started, "This isn't what it looks like." Hiroki quickly retorted, "Well, it looks like a super mega-computer. Are you trying to tell me it isn't?" Aelita bit her lip. Reaching for the controls of the supercomputer, she was about to strike the enter key to launch a return to the past, when Hiroki stopped her.

He grabbed her arm, and twisted it. "I'm not letting you go until you tell me what you're doing here!" he said giving the ultimatum.

"Hiroki," hissed Aelita through her teeth, "This isn't any of your business!"

Ignoring Yumi's annoying brother, Aelita managed in an arm wrestle to hit the enter key on the return to the past program. A white light engulfed the room and then the factory—and then it died making a whirring noise and retracting itself. The red error sign popped up on the screen along with the green plus sign, which greatly confused Aelita.

Hiroki twitched a moment releasing his grasp on Aelita. "Oh my gosh. Crabs attacked my house…Yumi got sent to the hospital because of electric birds attacking her…something called XANA took control of a military satellite…Aelita what is going on?" he mumbled wide-eyed with fear.

Aelita couldn't help but smile, "Well just what you said, Hiroki. And much much more."

Hiroki, being the stupid annoying brother he was yelled, "I'm gonna tell Mom and Dad!" Aelita elbowed him hard, making him fall down.

"Oh, but I'm sorry, Hiroki. I can't let you do that."

"Wanna bet!"

"I've taken on XANA more times than I can ever count. A tiny seventh grade boy? Now that should be a piece of cake," smiled Aelita pulling out a roll of duct tape.

Yumi's House

Yumi's cell phone rang and she groggily rolled over to answer it. "Why would Aelita call me at four in the morning? Surely it's not a XANA attack. He's destroyed."

"Hello?" she answered warily.

"Yumi! Hiroki is in the factory and I don't know how long this duct tape is going to hold him!"

"What? Why's Hiroki in the factory? Wait, why are _you _in the factory?"

"Not the point. The issue is, we have to get rid of Hiroki."

"Why don't you just do a return to the past?"

"I did," replied Aelita gravely.

A moment of silence ensued.

"I tried to do the return to the past but it didn't work, and worse Hiroki is remembering everything. The time the Crabs were virtualized and attacked your house, the time XANA took control of the satellite, the time Johnny took you to the hospital."

Yumi sat up now. "The only way he could remember is for him to be scanned into the supercomputer…was he scanned?"

"No, I checked. He doesn't have an avatar."

"This is weird. But what's wrong with telling Hiroki? XANA is gone for good."

"I'm just not sure," said Aelita, "So you called Odd, and I'll call Jeremie and we'll get this thing sorted out."

At the Factory

Odd, Ulrich, Jeremie, Aelita, and Yumi were gathered curiously around Hiroki, who had been skillfully duct-taped to the wall. Yumi yanked the tape off of her brother's mouth. "Yumi!" yelled Hiroki, "What is going on?!"

"Hiroki, how did you even get here?" asked Ulrich impatiently. "I followed Aelita," he replied. Jeremie eyed Aelita. "Then why were you coming here?"

Aelita blushed, "I don't know. I was sleep-walking I guess." Hiroki untangled himself and laughed at Aelita. Yumi turned to her brother. "Hiroki can you keep this a secret?"

"Depends, are you willing to do a year of my homework?"

"A week."

"A month."

"Three weeks."

"Deal," said Hiroki gleefully.

"Now go home," said Yumi.

Hiroki scampered off and Jeremie went to examining the return to the past program. "How about we try it again?" suggested Jeremie. The group shrugged and the white light did the same as before. It didn't work.

"I never thought we'd get back on the virtual horse," said Odd.

"We aren't getting back on the 'virtual horse' Odd. And we aren't going back to Lyoko," grunted Jeremie as he tried again and again to return to the past.

"Give it up, Jer, it's broken," muttered Ulrich.

"No!"

Aelita finally spoke, "Jeremie, stop it. Everytime you do that you are adding another cubit to XANA'S power."

"Aelita! XANA is dead. Remember? Your father sacrificed his life to make that possible!"

Aelita shook her head tears trickling down her cheeks. Ulrich not knowing what to say mumbled, "C'mon guys, it's almost time for school. We can figure this out later."

"Yeah," Odd smiled, "And this time we can close the book on our adventures one more time."

But no, the book had only just opened.


	2. Return to Lyoko

Disclaimer: I don't own Code Lyoko—that means I don't own Jeremie, Aelita, Ulrich, Odd, Yumi, Hiroki, Sissy, Herve, Nicolas, Jim, or any of those other characters.

Claimer: Fauna is my creation

The group could tell something was wrong with Aelita when she refused to eat breakfast that morning and simply kept her head on the table moping miserably.

"Way to go, Jeremie," mumbled Odd, glaring at him, defending Aelita.

"Hey, it's not my fault Franz Hopper died to destroy XANA," complained Jeremie.

As if anything to make Aelita feel worse was needed, Sissy and her cronies, Herve and Nicolas pranced up to the lunch table. "Hey Aelita, what's wrong?" sneered Sissy laughing, "Have anymore bad dreams about wolves and elves?" Aelita turned away angrily.

"Hey Sissy, leave her alone!" yelled Ulrich standing up from the table. "Remember how I said we could be friends? Well you're off to a very poor start."

Sissy glared at Ulrich. "I said I'd be _your _friend. I didn't say I'd be Aelita's."

Odd stood up too now. "Well if you're going to be friends with Ulrich, you've got to be friends with all of us!"

Sissy smirked, "I might, if you tell me your secret."

Jeremie spoke quickly, "We don't have a secret Sissy. We haven't gone anywhere for the past two weeks."

"Oddly enough."

"Look Sissy," said Ulrich sternly, "Aelita's been through some rough times, so don't make fun of her."

This squabbling amongst the group and Sissy continued on, only frustrating Aelita and making her feel worse than before.

Aelita shoved the chair away from the table and stood up. A tray, somehow possessed, or so it seemed, flew up from a nearby table and viciously whacked Sissy, Ulrich, Odd, and Jeremie across the back of their heads.

"Go away," said Aelita past the verge of tears, "Go away all of you."

She ran out of the cafeteria, causing the other kids to look at her curiously. She ran into Yumi on the way out and kept on. Yumi looked at the group, directly at Jeremie and asked, "God, Jeremie, what did you say this time?"

Jeremie was now starting to get worked up about this. "I didn't say anything!" he yelled exasperatedly.

"Uh-huh."

"Well I didn't."

Yumi shook her head and turned to chase after Aelita. By this point, Aelita was already in the woods, nearing the manhole to slink her way back to the factory. Although she knew that would be the first place the group would look for her, she couldn't think of a safer place to be.

At the Factory:

Aelita stepped into one of the scanners, a feat that less than two weeks ago, she had decided to never do again. The door closed and the warm light began to surround Aelita.

Transfer Aelita. Scanner Aelita. Virtualization.

Aelita opened her eyes to find herself in the ice sector of Lyoko. Perfect, for that is how she felt at the moment—ice cold. Aelita turned and ran, setting off towards the cavern hidden behind the waterfall. "XANA is not dead. I know it in my heart and soul," she muttered running.

Alas, it seemed as if XANA were dead, for no monsters attacked, no mantas, creepers, hornets, kankrelots, crabs, blocks, megatanks, or any other distasteful creatures found their way to the Guardian of Lyoko.

Aelita walked through the chamber to the waterall looking up at the one unactive tower sitting desolately. Memories flashed through Aelita's eyes. She remembered the time she couldn't get in the tower, and how Jeremie had fixed it. She remembered being materialized, however that was in the forest. She remembered Odd and Ulrich fighting to save her, and Yumi, also Yumi.

Clenching her firsts she forced herself to walk forward. She didn't notice it, but she was clenching her fists so tightly that little energy fields were forming, illuminating the cavern with a pinkish glow.

Aelita closed her eyes, thinking in horror, of how she had met the white glowing sphere that was Franz Hopper, before only ten minutes later, witnessing his crushing demise, as he sacrificed himself to save them all.

Aelita lied down on the cold icy floor, curled up near the base of tower. "Maybe I should go back," she mumbled, "But how? There isn't a monster out there to devirtualize me, and as nice as these energy fields are, I can't devirtualize myself."

Back at the Factory:

Yumi and Jeremie were crowded around the supercomputer, trying to locate Aelita. "There she is!" pointed Yumi at the small red dot on the screen labeled Aelita. The elevator opened, as Odd and Ulrich reported that she was not in any of the store rooms.

"It's okay, guys, we found her," replied Jeremie, searching around for his headset.

"Hey Aelita, you can come back now," said Jeremie into the headset. Aelita looked up at the sound of the voice, but said nothing in reply.

"C'mon Aelita, I'm sorry for whatever I said," apologized Jeremie. Still no response.

"Aelita? You there?"

"Yes, now go away," commanded Aelita through grit teeth.

"Aelita. C'mon. Here, I'm going to devirtualize you," said Jeremie in a calm voice.

Aelita shouted back an angry response that shocked the others. They had never seen her this mad. Whatever dream had caused her to sleepwalk to the factory must've been really horrible.

"Aelita, will you forgive me, if I go to Lyoko myself to bring you back?" asked Jeremie hoping she would.

"You've tried that before, Jer. Remember? You were trapped in virtual limbo between Lyoko and the real world? This time, if you try it, I'm not saving you," spat Aelita viciously.

"Ooh, Einstein, you've really made her mad. I would not want to be in your shoes right now," commented Odd. Yumi elbowed him in disgust.

"What if I send Odd, or Ulrich, or Yumi? Then will you come home?" pleaded Jeremie.

"If you send the others, I'll devirtualize them faster than XANA'S monsters."

"Aelita, you have to come home eventually."

"Jer, if you don't quit pestering me, right now, then I will go to that way tower, and I will enter Code XANA, deleting this whole sector."

"Aelita, if you did that, you'd end up falling into the digital sea. Plus, you worked so hard on remaking this sector, why would you want to throw it away?"

Aelita refused to answer.

Jeremie paced the room thinking of a solution to get Aelita off of Lyoko without her hating him, and without her deleting Lyoko. Ulrich mumbled something that caused Yumi to tell him to shut up, but other than that, the room stayed quiet.

Aelita sat up on the ice, by this time getting hungry and considering returning to Earth. "If only I could virtualize food," she muttered pacing the cavern the same way Jeremie was pacing the computer lab.

"Food? Really XANA? You're sounding awfully human today," came a voice from behind her.

_Will Jeremie find a way to bring Aelita home? Will Aelita get over the fact Franz Hopper and XANA are gone? Are Franz and XANA gone for good? And who is this mysterious person/thing who just confused Aelita with XANA? Find out in the next chapter: Other Warriors_


End file.
